VCO 403 – evaluation quotes and links

Butterflies are bound up in our childhood, and maybe that is why they loom so large in our creative consciousness later in life.

Apart from their rich association with childhood, butterflies are symbols of freedom, the embodiment of living life to the full. In many cultures they represent human souls; in medieval Ireland, white butterflies were thought to be dead children; white butterflies have also been discovered fluttering in the cells of recently executed Tibetan monks.

Even if being confined to a room in Tate Modern is a melancholy prospect, Hirst’s butterflies encourage us to reflect on how ephemeral life is for every insect – and for their human spectators.

You get some sort of security from the repetition of a series. If you say something twice, it’s pretty convincing. It’s more convincing than if you say it once

I think it’s also an implication of endlessness, which kind of theoretically helps you avoid death.

People are afraid of change, so you create a kind of belief for them through repetition. It’s like breathing. So I’ve always been drawn to series and pairs. A unique thing is quite a frightening object.

‘Natural History’ that was called. I just imagined a zoo of dead animals

the way the real butterfly can destroy the ideal (birthday-card) kind of love; the symbol exists apart from the real thing.”[2] Recalling someone once saying to him: “Butterflies are beautiful, but it’s a shame they have disgusting hairy bodies in the middle,” Hirst chose to use only the iridescent wings in the ‘Kaleidoscope’ paintings, divorcing the butterflies from “the real thing”